Snape's Sadness
by UnicornAmy
Summary: Severus gets a letter from a relative, with news he did not expect ever to get. OOTP spoilers. Please Read and Review!
1. Author's Note

Author's Note:   
  
A) I don't own Harry Potter or any of the characters in the Potterverse. I write fanfictions because of the creativity Ms. Rowling's writng inspire in me.  
  
B) Severus Snape is my favoritre character in the entire Potterverse, and I have always felt more than a little sorry for him. Now that I know more about his background, I fel even worse for him. With this story, I try to heal his hurts and give him a little closure on his childhood. 


	2. The Owl

Severus Snape sat in his room at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, clutching a piece of parchment in his hands. It'd been delivered to him by Special Owl Post fifteen minutes before, free of charge. He couldn't believe what it said.  
  
"Dear Severus,  
  
You're needed back in Blackpool immediately. Your father, sadly, has finally passed on. Nephew, dear, I know that you have had no love for your father since you left for Hogwarts on the Hogwarts Express many, many, years ago, but you can't not say goodbye to him. I look forward to seeing you, Severus, and I still love you.  
  
Your Aunt,  
  
Mairwen Snape."  
  
He hadn't heard from his Aunt Mairwen in many, many years, long before he became Master of Potions here at Hogwarts. She hadn't even been at his mother's funeral. Now, to get THIS letter from her, bearing THIS news... he did not have words to expres the range of emotions he was feeling. Anger for his father, who ruined his and his mother's lives, hatred that even in death he could disrupt Severus's simple life, confusion at the letter in his hands. Could it be true? He was finally free of that leering bastard at last, he would never have to look upon his face -so much like his own- ever again?  
  
He finally gathered himself back together. Ah, well, he thought, putting on his cloak and heading out the door, I had nothing to fear from the old man anyway, not now. Snape went up the stone steps cut into the wall of the dungeons and walked towards Professor Dumbledore's office. He reached the stone gargoyle that guarded the Headmaster's office, mumbled, "Everlasting Gobstopper,"and climbed the moving staircase, taking the steps two at a time. He'd barely reached the door when the headmaster opened it, saying, "Can I help you , Severus?"  
  
"Yes, sir. I need to leave the school for a few days, maybe even a week. You see, my father, Gade, has just passed on, and I am needed to go to Blackpool."  
  
"By all means, Severus. You needn't have even asked permission, especially now that summer is here and the students are all gone. Go to your family." Professor Dumbledore looked at him with sadness in his eyes.  
  
"I just wanted to make sure, Headmaster. After all, with the Ministry knowing that Lord Voldemort has returned, I feel that my first priority ought to be the Order of the Phoenix."  
  
"Nonsense, Severus. Always, one's family, no matter how bad of a family it is, is first. Now, go."  
  
"Yes, Professor Dumbledore." He turned to leave.  
  
"Severus?" Professor Dumbledore reached out to put a restraining hand on his shoulder. "You're always welcome in my office for tea, or for a chat."  
  
"Yes, sir." Severus smiled wanly and left the office, allowing the escalator to take him back down. Dumbledore was a very good man, even he had to admit that. After all, would any other man have given him a job after being a Death Eater? He bustled back to his room, and lit a fire in his grate with his wand. He grabbed some Floo powder from the bag hanging from the mantle and threw it into the fire. With a glance back at his rooms he stepped into the grate, and said very clearly, "Snape Hall." The familiar whooshing took him to his old room at his father's house, Snape Hall. He stopped and thought about it. With his father's death, that meant that Snape Hall probably belonged to him now, no matter how much his father hated him in life, and probably in death. Sadness stuck in his throat as he thought about his mother, Kaia, dead these 14 years, destroyed at last by Gade's hatred. It had been the day of her funeral that Severus had sworn he'd not step foot in Snape Hall again until his father was no longer in this world. The day after that, he'd had his application at Hogwarts accepted, not as the Defense against the Dark Arts teacher that he'd wanted to be, but as Potions master. He took what he could get, though, and went to Hogwarts happily to try and rebuild his life. Now he was here again. He went downstairs, and was greeted by the sight of his Aunt Mairwen sitting at the table in the dining room alone.  
  
"Severus! I see you got my letter. Poor nephew, now we are truely all alone."  
  
"Aunt Mairwen, I have been alone for nearly fourteen years. How did he die?"  
  
"Yelling at Tan." She worn a tired smile on her face.  
  
"The house-elf? He died yelling at a house-elf?" It was almost funny. Gade the magnificent, the pompous, the hateful, dying while screaming at a house-elf! Oh, the farce of it all.  
  
"Yes. He had a heart attack. Tan was scared out of his mind. He popped to St. Mungo's and summoned the healers. Alas, they could do nothing when they got here. He was already growing stiff when they apparated."  
  
A cruel smile had been threatening to form on Severus' face when his aunt smacked him open-handed across the back. "I know you hated him, Sev, but show some respect! He was your father, no matter what else he was."   
  
Severus looked at her, stunned. "But he hurt you, too. You've told me so before! How can you stand before me and say that."  
  
"Because, Sev, we are survivors. We are here and he is not. Now, everything has been attended to, so you can just go up to your room and try to get some sleep. I'm going home for now, and I'll be back tomorrow for the cremation." She dissappeared with a pop. Severus sat down in the chair that she'd been sitting in. he was alone, for the first time ever, in Snape Hall. He wasn't very tired, and he didn't know what to do. After sitting there for a while, he got up and began to walk the halls of the mansion. He found himself being pulled towards Kaia's room. He'd never been allowed in there while either of his parents had been alive, but who was to bar his way now? He paused with his hand against the heavy oak door, almost expecting his father's harsh, deep voice to shout, "Boy! Get away from there! Don't you know better yet?!", followed by the rough smack from the man's cane across his back. Then he threw off his fear and opened the door.  
  
His mother's room. He did not know what he had expected, but this surely was not it. It was more like a cell. There was a bed only big enough for one person, made with rough woolen sheets, a lamp on one bedside table that leaned towards the door. Leaning awkwardly against one wall was a oval mirror with it's glass cracked spiderweblike. Against another wall was a small desk, with a small chair to match. It was to this desk he strode first. All his mother's belongings were still here, her jewelry and her few knick knacks. He opened her jewelry box and looked through her favorite pieces there. Her wedding ring (oh, his poor mother. How she must have dreamed.), a locket, and her engagement ring lay together wrapped in a tissue. He took them and put them in his pocket. He'd wondered for years where they'd gone. They were the only peices of jewelry that he'd ever seen her take any pride in. The locket had contained a picture of Severus and his mother, and he wondered if it was still there. He opened it, and there she was, smiling out of the frame, holding a one-year-old version of himself on her lap. Severus began to feel tears, unwanted as early snow, pricking at the back of his eyes. He opened her the drawers of her desk and found nothing but dust until he opened the last one. Lying there was a journal, not unlike the one that he had seen Ginny Weasley writing in nearly three years ago. He'd nearly taken that journal away from Ginny because she'd been writing in it during class one day. It still haunted him to this day that he hadn't. But this journal! It was his mother's, and he felt his heart begin to race. He picked it up and left the room. He had no desire to go near his father's room, not now. He hurried to his own room and sat at his own desk, and looked at the journal. It was fastened with a lock unlike any other he'd ever seen before. He tried opening it with Alohamora, but nothing happened. Then he looked at the locking mechanism closely. The lock was held together by his mother's locket! He hastily opened the locket and placed it in the lock. It clicked open.  
  
He grabbed a quill and dipped it in the years-old ink there on his desk. He paused as his hand trembled over the first page. Here was his opportunity. He put the pen to the paper and began to write.  
  
"Mother? Are you there?" His hand still threatened to tremble, but he willed himself to be calm. His words were absorbed into the page and slowly different words formed.  
  
"Sev? Is that my little Severus?" It was his mother's script, curved and delicate, there on the page.  
  
"Mother, it is me! Oh, Mother, I miss you."  
  
"I assume that since you have found this, your father has died, too?"   
  
"Yes, Mother."  
  
"How did he die, my son?"  
  
Severus told her what his Aunt Mairwen told him, and he could almost hear his mother's laughter as she wrote, "The house-elf?!"  
  
"Yes, Mother."  
  
"Well, good riddance to him. He was never very good to us, was he, Sev?"  
  
Severus though for a moment. His earliest memories were of Gade yelling at his mother, while he, Severus, curled up in a corner pretending not to be alive.  
  
"Mother, why? Why did you let him do the things he did?"  
  
"You mean before or after you were born?"  
  
"Both."  
  
"Severus, your father's family was very important when he was attending Hogwarts. Your grandfather, Paras, was the Minister of Magic. I was going to Beauxbatons but was sent to Hogwarts as an exchange student in my seventh year and was sorted into Ravenclaw. Your father was of course a Slytherin."  
  
"All Snapes are." Severus wrote bitterly.  
  
"Yes. Your father saw me my first day at Hogwarts and he decided then and there that he had to have me. He may have even though he loved me. I'm not sure. I saw your father and fell head over heels in love. Gade was a big man at Hogwarts, and what he wanted he got. He wanted me. We married right after seventh year ended and I moved in to his father's house. His father retired from the Ministry and died a year later. After we were alone, things went bad."  
  
"But you haven't answered me, Mother."  
  
"You wanted to know why? I'll tell you, my little Severus. I was aftraid that he'd kill me if I left. After you were born, he told me that if I left, it'd be you he killed and not me. That kept me here. My love for you kept me here."  
  
Severus was crying openly now. His mother had suffered so much from his father, and most of it was his fault. A tear ran off his hooked nose, so much like his father's, and fell onto the page, where it was absorbed.  
  
"Sev, do not cry. I'm okay now. You see, before I died, I put most of my mind and awareness into this journal in the hopes that you might one day find it. You shall never have to be alone again, my dearest son."  
  
Severus' heart leapt. Here was his opportunity have his mother back again, without his father's leering face over their shoulders all the time. Would he take it? 


	3. The Dream

Severus took the journal back to his room. How could he have not known that his mother had stayed here with his father, through all the bad times and all the pain, so that he could live? He felt guilty just for being alive. He sat on his bed, still made with the same set of sheets he had used as a child, and laid back. Staring up at the ceiling, he played with his wand, oak with a drangon heartstring as it's core. He fell asleep with his wand in his hand and his stringy black hair streaming to the side of his face- a face that wore a look of peace for the first time ever. Sadly his peaceful frame of mand could not carry into his well-deserved sleep...  
  
"He's your son, too, Gade! Severus is a good boy, and you should be proud of him! Not everyone gets accepted into Beauxbatons and Hogwarts, you know!" Kaia yelled from behind the closed door, fear in her voice.  
  
"He will not go to Beauxbatons! The very thought of it is insulting to the Snape name! All Snapes go to Hogwarts!" Gade's voice resounded through the mansion. Severus would have been able to hear it even if he had not been standing in front of the door to the dining room. He knew that this arguement was about him.  
  
Three hours ago, two owls had swooped into that room during breakfast, both with letters addressed to Master Severus Snape, Snape Hall, Blackpool, England. He'd recognized the seals on them at once. One was from Hogwarts, the school of his ancestors, and the other one was from Beauxbatons, where he knew his mother had gone. He tore both letters open and had marveled at their news. He was so excited that he forgot himself, and ran around the long table to his mother's side.  
  
"Mother! Mother, look! I got into Hogwarts and Beauxbatons! Mother, which shall I choose?!" Eleven-year-old Severus had never been so happy in his whole life. He knew that THIS would make his father proud of him. It had too.  
  
Gade looked down the table in disgust. "Hasn't your mother taught you anything, boy? Get back to your chair this instant!" He made a menacing move towards his ivory cane that he kept at his side. Even as young as he was, Severus knew the pain that cane could inflict. He scurried back to his chair quickly and sat down.  
  
"Which school do you want to go to, Severus?" His mother's kind face cheered him a little. She was happy for him, at least.  
  
"I... I'd like to go to Beauxbaton, Mother. Isn't that where you went until you transferred to Hogwarts?"  
  
Gade exploded in fury. "Nonsense, boy! You shall go to Hogwarts, the school of my father, and his father before him! There's no choice about it! How dare you even suggest that you, a Snape of Snape blood, a pureblood, go anywhere but Hogwarts!" His face was crimson with fury as he glared down the table at the poor child, who was trying to melt into his chair.  
  
"I...I just thought..." Severus couldn't think of anything to say.  
  
"You just thought what? That you were too good for tradition?! That you would just throw away lifetimes of tradion and honor and go to that fluffy school full of good-for-nothing bunnies? You shall go to Hogwarts, boy! There is no question about it! You shall be schooled by the finest teachers in the world!"  
  
"Why don't you let him choose, Gade?" Kaia's face was sad.   
  
"Choice! What choice is there here?! Hogwarts is where he is going, there's no doubt about that! All Snapes go to Hogwarts! You yourself graduated from there, didn't you, Kaia?!" There was venom in his voice. Severus knew to keep quiet.  
  
"Yes, Gade, I did, but if you remember, I transferred from Beauxbatons in our seventh year."  
  
"So what, Kaia?! You graduated from Hogwarts and that is all that matters. The boy will go to Hogwarts. That is final."   
  
When Gade Snape said that something was final, there was no questioning it, so Severus let the matter drop. He would go to Hogwarts. He excused himself from the table and went to his room to cry. Severus cried a lot in the privacy of his own room...  
  
Severus woke up in a cold sweat, with tears rolling down his thin cheeks. He'd wanted to go to Beauxbatons so badly, he'd cried himself to sleep many nights afterward. He'd known Hogwarts would be a disaster for him, and he hadn't been far wrong. As he laid there, a small knock came at his door.  
  
"Who's there?" Severus sat up and wiped his face quickly. The door opened slightly and a small house-elf edged in. "Hi, Tan."  
  
"Master Severus, it is good to Tan to see you home, it is." Tan was wearing a napkin for clothing. "Master Severus is Master now. Tan wishes to serve Master Severus. Master Severus never hurt or yelled at Tan." Tan looked at Severus with big, watering eyes. Snape thought for a minute and then asked a question that had always bugged him.  
  
"Tan, do you wish to be free of your service to the Snape family?" Tan's eyes got as large as marbles, and he began to tremble. Severus knew what the answer would be before Tan answered.  
  
"Never, sir, would I ever expect to be freed! Freedom is for bad elves, Master Severus! Do not jest with poor Tan!" Tan turned and ran from the room, and Severus went back to sleep. 


	4. The Letter

After his fitful night's sleep, Severus rose to greet the new day.He still was not sure of what to do about Tan and his mother's journal, but he couldn't think about that now. He had his father's funeral to worry about. According to Tan, Aunt Mairwen was already downstairs and waiting for him, so he hurried down to the kitchen. There she sat, a wry smile on her face.   
  
"Good morning, Severus. Tan tells me you didn't sleep well." She beckoned for hom to sit next to him. "Tell me about it." Severus told her about his dream, and how he'd wanted to free Tan, but Tan didn't want it.  
  
"Severus, Snape Hall is yours to do with what you like, of course, but let me tell you something. It is a house-elf's duty to serve one family until his or her death. Freedom means disgrace to them." He thought about Dobby, back at Hogwarts. The entire wizarding world knew about how Dobby got wages, and how he was happy about that. Dobby was treated like the plague by the other house-elves, except for the one called Winky. Winky cried most of the time because her family was dead- all of them. He couldn't doom Tan to an existence like that. "Severus, you father left a letter for you in my possession when last we met. He knew his time was fast coming and he knew that he'd never see you again while he lived. I have never opened that letter, so I do not know what it says. If you do not want it, I will destroy it, it never being read."  
  
Severus looked into his Aunt's black eyes. A letter? What ever coud the old man have to say to him? Did he even want to know?  
  
"Give me the letter, Aunt Mairwen. I will read it. I can't hold a grudge against a dead man, I guess." He was thinking about his mother as he said the words. Mairwen retrieved the letter from her purse and handed it over.  
  
"I'll leave you alone while you read it." She got up and left the room. Severus looked at the envelope in his hands. It was many years old, this letter, at least three. He must have written it just after Sirius escaped from Azkaban. He broke the Snape family crest that was holding the envelope together, and took out a piece of parchement as thin as rice paper. On it was his father's neat scrawl.  
  
"Boy,  
  
As I write this, it has been eleven years since I have seen you. I know now that you will never come home to me, and I can't blame you for that. I owe you much, boy. Mostly I owe you this: I am sorry.  
  
I am sorry that I did not make your childhood a happy place. I am sorry that I hit you, that I broke your arm, and your heart. I am sorry that I did not treat you as I wanted to. I never told you this while I lived, boy, but I loved you, and your mother. I know that if you are reading this now, I am dead. I am sorry for that, too. I had hoped, especially now that I am all alone here, except for Tan. I can't explain how much sorrow I feel now.  
  
Let me explain something to you. I wanted to be better to you. I just didn't know how to be. Your grandfather was a very cruel man, and I never wanted to be like him. I ended up making all his mistakes, though, and for that I can never apologize. We Snapes have always been Dark Wizards, no matter what, and I can't tell you how proud I was when you got into both Hogwarts and Beauxbaton. I wanted you to go to Beauxbaton, boy. It was family pride that kept me from saying it. I'm sorry, boy. I really am. I know what hell Hogwarts was for you. I can't apologize for that, because that hell made you the man you are today.   
  
My pride grew as you did, son. You showed such a talent for potions, and that has always been this family's strong point. When you joined the Dark Lord, my heart sank. I knew that I could lose you in the war. You, boy, my only son, made me the proudest when you turned on him and rejoined the good. You always had an independent streak a mile wide. I'm glad that you are happy at last. Nost of all, I'm glad you are working at Hogwarts, trying to help Dumbledore.  
  
Boy, I'm sorry. Please forgive me now. Take care of Snape Hall, and take care of Tan.   
  
I loved you, Severus.  
  
Your Father,  
  
Gade Snape."  
  
Severus put the letter down, crying again. His father had said everything he'd ever wanted to hear, in that letter. He wanted to tell his father that everything was okay, that things were good now. Oh, if only he'd come home before now. He father could have told him all of this in person, and not in a letter.   
  
His aunt came back in the room. "I don't want to know what it said, Sev. That was between you and him. He loved you, Severus." Severus looked at her for a moment and then he realized something. "He never once used my name. Ever. Not even in this letter."  
  
"Gade wasn't a very friendly person. Our father expected a lot of him. You have to remember that Father was Minister of Magic-"  
  
"And my Father never let me or my mother forget that."  
  
"-and he expected a lot out of his children. We both failed him."  
  
From a news story in the Daily Prophet:  
  
Gade Snape's funeral took place with only three people in attendance, his sister Mairwen Snape, his son Severus Snape, Potions Master of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and Albus Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardy, Supreme Mugwump, International Confederation of Wizards, and Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot. Gade Snape was the son of Faolan Snape, former Minister of Magic, and came to prominesce during the reign of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named as a supporter of Muggle Hunting. Gade Snape died at his home of a heart attack Tuesday night, and Healers were unable to revive him.  
  
As Severus packed up what few belongings he wanted to take with him from Snape Hall back to Hogwarts, his eyes fell on his mother's journal. He still hadn't decided what he would do about it. He looked down at it there on his desk and then, with a lunge that was almost a spasm, he put it in his suitcase that he'd taken from his closet. He would take it with him, he thought. It made him feel better to know that he could talk to his mother if need ever rose. Looking back, he told Tan to keep the place neat and tidy, that he'd be back before the summer was over to take him to Hogwarts for the duration of the school year.  
  
With little regret, he threw a bit of Floo powder into the grate, stepped into the fire that now burned green and said clearly, "Hogwarts Dungeons." 


	5. Author's End Note

Author's Note:  
  
Well, that's it for Severus Snape for now. I hope I gave him a little bit of closure. I may write more about him, I'm not sure yet. If you'd like to read more about Gade, or Kaia, or even Faolan, let me know! As always, Read and Review! 


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